What Words Were First Recorded the Year You Were Born? Merriam-Webster Breaks it Down

We now know memes as images with funny captions that get shared across social media, but the term has actually been around far longer than the internet. Scientist and author Richard Dawkins coined it in 1976, using it to mean “an idea, behavior, style, or usage that spreads from person to person within a culture,” according to Merriam-Webster’s definition. That same year also saw the rise of barbie, body piercing, extra-virgin (as in olive oil), killer bee, PMS, pooper-scooper, skeevy, trail mix, and ‘tude.

Thanks to Merriam-Webster’s online “Time Traveler” tool, it’s now easier than ever to look back at a particular year or century and see which words were recorded for the very first time. For instance, you can select your birth year—any other bestie babies out there?—or read up on the words that emerged during a particular point in history. (We checked the 1590s, when Shakespeare was producing some of his best work, and a few of the words were quite fitting: avenging, bloodstained, self-sacrifice, and to-be.)

It might also be a surprise to learn just how long certain words have been around. Clickbait and vape, for instance, were first recorded in 1999, and bae has been around since at least 1983. The earliest year included on the Time Traveler tool is 1472, and if you go back any further, it’s broken down by century. “Before the 12th century" is the oldest category listed.

It's important to note that the tool tracks the “first known use date” of a word, but its first usage might actually be older. “The date most often does not mark the very first time that the word was used in English,” Merriam-Webster notes. “Many words were in spoken use for decades or even longer before they passed into the written language. The date is for the earliest written or printed use that the editors have been able to discover.”

Still, it provides a fascinating glimpse into the written history of many English words. Some of the newest ones are slang terms or words that stem from digital culture, like manspreading (2014), bingeable (2013), hot take (2012), blockchain (2011), and Instagram (2010). We were also given aquafaba—the liquid that results when beans are cooked in water—in 2015. So there’s that.

40 Dandy D-Words To Deepen Your Vocabulary

It’s thought that the earliest ancestor of our humble letter D was an Ancient Egyptian hieroglyph representing a door, which is where D get its hollowed-out shape from. Over time, that hieroglyph became a Phoenician letter, dalet, which then became the Greek letter delta, and finally the Roman letter D, which arrived in England (along with most of the rest of the modern alphabet) from continental Europe more than 1500 years ago.

Before then, English was written using a runic writing system called futhorc, a number of the letters of which—likethorn (Þ þ) and wynn (Ƿ ƿ)—survived into the Old English period before dying out later. The Old English letter eth(Ð ð), however, effectively went the other way: it was invented in Britain (or perhaps Ireland) after the introduction of the Latin alphabet to England, and is actually a derivative of the Roman letter D. Although it too eventually fell out of use, it still survives in modern-day Icelandic.

Nowadays, D is one of the most frequently used letters of our alphabet, accounting for just over 4 percent of a standard page of English text (or one out of every 25 letters), and roughly 2.5 percent of all the words in a standard dictionary—including the 40 delicious D words listed here…

1. DAB-DUMP

An old Yorkshire dialect word for a pool of water left on the beach after the tide retreats.

2. DABERLICK

Daberlick or dabberlack is an old dialect name for long, straggly seaweed. Figuratively, it can be used as a nickname for greasy, lank hair, or for a tall, gangly person.

3. DABSTER

An astute or especially skilled worker.

4. DAFFLED

If you’re daffled, then you’re bewildered or disorientated by a sensory overload.

5. DANDIE-CLAW

A dandie-claw is an easily completed task or, when used in the phrase, “to give it the dandie-claw,” it essentially means “that won’t last long,” or “that won’t take long to finish off.” No one is quite sure where the phrase comes from, but it’s possible that a dandy or dandie-claw was originally a small brush used to groom horses, which at some point in time might have become synonymous with a brief or undemanding chore.

6. DANDLE

To bounce a baby on your knee is to dandle it.

7. DANG-SWANG

To do something dang-swang is to do it vigorously, or with great energy or enthusiasm.

8. DANGLEMENT

An 18th century word either for a finger, or for a dangling decoration, or trim on a garment. A danglet—literally a “little dangle”—is an icicle.

9. DAPPERPYE

An old adjective meaning “variegated” or “multi-colored.”

10. DAPPERWIT

A quick-witted, lively young man.

11. DARING-HARDY

12. DAWK

A thick fog or mist.

13. DAYLIGAUN

An old Scots word for twilight, dayligaun literally means “daylight-going.”

14. DEAD-HORSE

As a metaphor for something that has ceased to be useful, the term dead horse is today more often than not used in the phrase “flogging a dead horse,” meaning “to fruitlessly continue with something all interest has been lost in.” Before then, however, dead-horse was a 17th-century term for work for which you’d been paid in full in advance—and so to work the dead-horse or for a dead horse meant “to busy yourself in work that at the end of which you won’t be paid.” A dead-man, incidentally, is an old English nickname for an empty liquor bottle, so being down among the dead-menmeant “passed out drunk on the floor” in 18th-century English.

18. DEDOLEATE

19. DEJERATE

To swear a solemn oath. Someone who does precisely that is a dejerator.

20. DEONERATE

To unpack cargo or to remove someone’s burden is to deonerate them. To depauperate them is to impoverish them, while to depulse them would be to drive them off.

21. DEPECULATE

Peculation is an old 17th-century legal term for embezzlement—in particular, the embezzlement of funds belonging to a country or head of state. To peculate or depeculate, ultimately, is an old-fashioned word meaning “to steal by peculation,” which was typically used to refer to public officials pilfering state funds for their own personal use.

22. DEPEDITATE

In medical terminology, a depeditation is the amputation of a foot. Thankfully, the relative verb depeditate can simply be used to mean “to be deprived of the use of your feet”—worth remembering next time you go deambulating in a new pair of shoes.

23. DEPROELIATION

Derived from a Latin word meaning “to engage violently in war,” deproeliation is just a 17th-century word for a battle.

24. DIABLERIE

The perfect word for Dr. Faustus: diablerie is work or business done with, or for, the Devil. Figuratively, it can mean recklessness or audaciousness, or else any underhand, shady dealing.

25. DIABLOTIN

Borrowed into English from French in the 1800s, a diablotin is a tiny devil or imp. It’s also, because of its unusual appearance, a nickname for the oilbird.

26. DIAL-PLATE

An 18th century nickname for a person’s face (derived from the dial or “face” of a clock).

27. DILLYALL

An old English dialect word for anything owned because it looks nice, not because it’s useful or functional.

28. DILORICATE

To diloricate something is to rip or tear it. It derives from a Latin word, lorica, for a Roman soldier’s leather cuirass or breastplate—and so might originally have referred to injuries suffered in battle that were bad enough to puncture armor.

29. DIMBER

Dimber was a 17th-century word meaning “pretty” or “smart,” while a dimber-damber was the leader or “face” of a gang of rogues or vagabonds.

30. DISCALCEATE

To discalceate is to remove your shoes. Worth remembering once you’ve deambulated and depeditated.

31. DO-NO-BETTER

The slightly less complimentary Edwardian equivalent of bae—a do-no-better or do-nae-better was “a sweetheart whom one has to be content with, for want of a better.”

32. DOATY

When your head nods up and down while you’re trying to stay awake? That’s doatying.

33. DOCH-AN-DORRIS

A doch-an-dorris or deochandorus is a “stirrup-cup”—a drink or toast made with, or in honor of, someone about to leave. It derives from an old 17th-century Scots Gaelic phrase, deoch an doruis, that literally means “door-drink.”

34. DOCK-WALLOPER

Originally a nickname for someone who hangs around dockyards looking for work, dock-walloper is an old 19th-century American slang word for a loafer or idler.

35. DOLLYMAWKIN

A frivolous, scatterbrained young woman.

36. DOODLE-SHOP

An old dialect nickname for a sweetshop.

37. DRAGGLETAIL

In 18th-century English, an untidily or slatternly dressed woman. Literally, a woman who has let the tails of her dress drag through the rain or mud.

38. DULCILOQUY

A soft or sweet manner of speaking. Likewise, if you’re dulciloquent, then you have a pleasant voice.

39. DUTCH CONCERT

The incomprehensibleness of Dutch to speakers of English is the origin of double Dutch, meaning “gibberish” or “nonsense,” and Dutch concert, an old nickname for an incongruous or cacophonous mishmash of noises or sounds.

To Apostrophe or Not to Apostrophe: How to Pluralize Your Last Name

Let's suppose your last name is Jones, and you and your family want to send out holiday greeting cards or wedding invitations. How would you make your last name plural—Jones'? Jones's? Or Joneses?

Although it may seem complicated at first, the rules of pluralizing last names are actually pretty simple, as Slate has pointed out. Unless you want to make your last name possessive, there aren't any circumstances where you would need to add an apostrophe.

The rule goes like this: If your name ends in s, x, z, ch, or sh, add -es to the end. Walsh becomes Walshes, and Malkovich becomes Malkoviches. For all other endings, simply add -s to the end (as in Smiths, Whites, Johnsons, etc).

Of course, things get a little trickier when you want to make a last name plural and possessive. "Errors involving plural proper names are so common that I almost never see them written correctly," June Casagrande writes for the Los Angeles Times.

Let's say you want to notify friends and family that a party will be held at the Jones household. You could take the easy way out and write just that, or you could opt for, "The party will be held at the Joneses' house." Simply tack an apostrophe onto the end of a plural name to make it possessive. Plural first, then possessive.

The LA Times provided a few other examples of plural possessives:

"Unlike singular possessives, which take an apostrophe followed by an S, plural possessives take an apostrophe alone. So if you're going to the home of the Smiths, you're going to the Smiths' house. If you're going to visit the Williamses, that would be at the Williamses' house. Mr. and Mrs. Mendez, known collectively as the Mendezes, live in the Mendezes' house. And Mr. and Mrs. Berry, whom we call the Berrys, live in the Berrys' house."

On the other hand, if Mr. Jones lived alone and was having a party at his place, you would write "Mr. Jones' house" or "Mr. Jones's house." Both are acceptable—it's merely a difference of style and personal preference. Names that end in s are the exception to the singular possessive rule, though. You'd normally just add 's to make a singular name possessive, such as Mr. Berry's house or Mrs. Mendez's house.

Now that you know exactly when and where to add an apostrophe, your holiday greetings will not only be jolly but also grammatically correct.